Today, we discuss the plot of Mandalore…or something like that.
Hello and welcome to ucast here, star Wars Cartoon podcast. My name is Matt, and weapons are part of my religion.
Similar thoughts. Uh, my name’s Jamie and maybe the dark Saber belongs in someone else’s hands.
Nice. I wonder what, wonder what today’s episode is. Yes. Yeah. So today we’re doing, we’re, this is episode 136 of, um, Ucast, uh, and we’re doing Clone Wars still. We’re doing season two, episode 12, the Manalo plot. So we get to go to Manalo for the first time, I think, ever.
Mm-hmm. And its original error date was January 29th. 2010. And even though this is not gonna go up for several weeks, because I’m way behind on posting these episodes, but we’ll post one, we’ll have a bunch coming out in December of 2024. Um, we were one day before skeleton crew. Yay. Yay. And so we, I figured we talked about this over text a little bit, but we got a care package from the official Star Wars, um, social media account or, or Star Wars I guess, um, that had a bunch of promotional material from um, skeleton crew in it.
And like I said, this is gonna go up several weeks after skeleton crew comes out. But it was sent, it was sent to me ’cause I gave them my address. ’cause I’m selfish. Um, yeah, I in, I’m in
witness relocation. Yeah, his name is Thompson. I think he’s talking to you.
this is, this is neither here nor there, but I might cut this out, but the other day, um, my wife and I were going someplace and she was basically wearing this velure, like, like house suit, like, looks like nice pajamas, right? Mm-hmm. It could be easily mistaken for like a tracksuit or something.
Yeah. My wife used to have one of those.
And so we were, we were gonna, we had to run someplace real quick and we had actually go to my lab and she was gonna go with me and she’s like, I’m not wearing a bra. Is that okay? And I was like, well, if you’re run into some federal breast inspectors, you’ll have to explain to them. So then we made jokes about the FBI, the entire way to the lab anyway.
Um, I don’t know why I said that. So we have this sting, we got this. Oh, because you’re in the witness relocation program. That’s right. That’s an FBI program. Anyway, the, go ahead.
I, uh, I thought it was US Marshals.
Yeah, it was US Marshals. Thank you. Can’t, can’t let, can’t let law enforcement petry get past us.
Um, so anyway, we have this package and I thought we could go over the contents of the package and, um, decide what I needed to ship you to make Ucast whole again, because I don’t want any, I don’t want any accusations that I am hoarding the, uh, the stuff.
Um, I sent you photos of everything, but we could run it down, run it down for everybody.
What, what was in this package? Um, and this, this was totally random, not anything I expected. Um, we just, they reached out to us through our Twitter account and it was a link to a Google Doc form, and it asked us for a shipping address and some information about our podcast. It was a form, so this was sent into presumably a lot of people.
Um, and then a few days later, I got a package, a really nondescript package. Didn’t say Lucasville monitor or anything, but I opened it up and there was a paper envelope about the size of like one of those legal manila envelopes, and it had the word Star Wars skeleton crew on the outside Disney Plus. And it had the, uh, the pirate droid sort of in a Jolly Rogers style flag.
On the, on the envelope. So it looked like a skull with two bones underneath it, except instead of bones, there was like, tools looked like a blaster and maybe a wrench. Mm-hmm. It possibly could be its arms. I don’t know. So anyway, I opened that up and then I sent you photos of everything that was inside.
Um, the first thing is there’s a gigantic flag and it is a Jolly Roger flag with that same logo, a droid head pirate, droid head with a patch eye, and then two arms or blaster and wrench beneath it with the skeleton crew logo in the, uh, corner. A flag is almost six feet across, maybe like six by three ish.
I didn’t measure it, but I, there’s a photo of me holding it and I’m six three. Yeah. Does it have grommets? It does not have grommets, but it has a sleeve like went into sewn, so you can slide it onto a flagpole.
Um, but yeah, there’s no grommets on it. I’m not exactly sure what I’m supposed to do with it.
Um, Chris Chrisy said we could put, get a flagpole and I could hang it out in the yard, but, uh, she’s been wanting to get a flagpole anyway, but I think that would be a little, little excessive. It is one-sided too. So the backside is just, there’s no backside to the flag. Ah,
does that make sense? This is more for you to put up, uh, like, like in your garage and or man cave, or Yes, this is a man cave decoration.
Or, , , if you’re a single, put it above, , put it above your headboard. Yeah, to let the ladies know that
they’re in for a treat. I hadn’t thought about putting it in our bedroom. Maybe that’s where it’ll end up. Um, we got a button, like a, like a big shirt button, like not a shirt button, but like one of those spring backed buttons.
Um, it says Wagman’s first Mate, and Swagman is the name of the unofficial name of the Star Wars Twitter account. And then there’s a box that looks like it’s, it’s like a Golden 10, and it has credit, it’s printed on the outside of it, and on the inside is a block of chocolate that has the skeleton crew logo on it.
It’s pretty fun. And then there was a message and a bottle, and the message is printed on like this sort of, I don’t know how to describe it, like, like fake parchment. And it says, I hear you’ve been searching for adventure. It’s time to join our crew stream, the two episode series, premier of Skeleton crew, December 2nd only on Disney plus, like we said, December 2nd is tomorrow.
Mm-hmm. And then there’s Arabish for skeleton crew on there and information about how to get in touch with Star Wars on social media. And then last thing is, I guess like a handkerchief. It’s like a two foot by two foot piece of cloth that has the, the robot or the droids face on it. It’s got some sort of like compass thing, compass looking, drawing on it.
It’s like silky. It’s really nice fabric. Um, and it says skeleton crew has a skeleton crew logo. That’s about it. Um, so it’s the chocolate, the message and the bottle, the button, the handkerchief or whatever this thing is supposed to be, and the flag. So I’m. I’m going to come right out and say it. I was super giddy about this.
We’ve had very little contact with Lucasfilm throughout this project of ours. Um, but years ago they did reach out to us pretty within the first two years of us doing this show. And someone there in the fan engagement office or whatever that office used to be called, told, told us that we were doing sort of a funny thing.
And that kept me going for a long time, that they had found us and thought that we were funny. Um, but we, we really hadn’t talked, haven’t talked much with them since. Anyone from Lucasfilm since then. Um, we talked with one of the horon keepers. The continuity people for a little bit. This guy named Leland, he and I talked for a while over social media and then of course, um, he’s not Marvel, he’s not, uh, Lucas Film, but Jordan White or Intro and Out outro music who is the editor of Star Wars comics for Marvel.
He and I would talk too about Marvel comics and his podcast where he was reviewing Sailor Moon, um, episodes and our podcast where we were reviewing Nirvana cartoons. And so that’s all to say we haven’t had very much contact. And so them reaching out and then sending us this stuff, that means a lot to me.
And I just. If you’re listening, thank you. I guess.
Yeah, that’s nice. Uh, has anybody else that you’re aware of gotten this so we can use it as, as a flex against them?
Um, I asked a few other podcasts if they had gotten, I won’t mention names. Um, if they had gotten the form and the few I asked the Po other Star Wars podcasts I interacted with, they all said no.
And I went looking for other people posting this flag thing. I didn’t look for very long. Um, and I didn’t find anybody else doing it, but it doesn’t mean that they haven’t done it. It’s just, it, it might be pretty rare, but that’s just fun. Like the, the two prize items really in the. Box are like this, the flag and this cloth, this like silky handkerchief, cloth.
Everything else is like message in the bottle, the button and the chocolate. But the two nice items are probably those things. And there’s, those are probably gonna be the, the harder items to, Ooh, I found someone that had it. Let’s see. Someone was just, I was just scrolling through Twitter with the hashtag skeleton crew and someone of course, right when I found it, I accidentally clicked away.
So a woman named Lacey, Gil posted her unboxing of this exact pack 10 hours ago. Um, and she has a podcast too, and she has 20,000 followers, so much more popular than us anyway, so people out there have. I’ve gotten this stuff and so we’re, we’re, I’m very happy that, that we were recognized, um, by them. But yeah, it’s, it is,
So, , it’s either, , it’s either a feather in our cap or maybe Lindsay needs to reevaluate her life if she’s being
grouped in with the likes of us. Yeah, it’s, it’s a compliment to us and an insult to everybody else because you’re either, you’re either in a group with us or you’re, or you weren’t good enough when measure it against us.
All right, well, we don’t, we don’t have to leave this in the pod, but. Hm. What would you like from this box?
Um, , I’ll take the, the, the, the Necker or the handkerchief or the Neckerchief, um, sure. Um, ’cause you’ll, uh, you’ll honestly appreciate this stuff a lot more than, than I will.
Um, yeah. I just wanna make sure that you didn’t think I was hoarding it and so like, I had no idea what was gonna be in this envelope or what they’re gonna send.
And, and this is not my show, so I want you to be very comfortable asking for the handkerchief, if that’s what you want.
Yeah. The, yeah, the handkerchief iss fine. Alright, cool. I’ll send it and I’ll shoot it off in the mail soon, this week. And, uh, yeah, just don’t use it. No. It’s, it’s nice. It’s a nice piece of cloth.
yes. Next time. Next time I’m, uh, next time I’m in a wedding,
I’ll, uh, make a pocket square out of it. Yeah, well show it to your wife and say, look how we’ve arrived.
Oh, I, I’ve tried. She’s not biting.
Did you tell her that the Star Wars sent us stuff?
Chrissy was really over the moon about it.
Like she was so excited. Um, she thought it was great that, that we’d gotten this like tiny bit of recognition from them. Um, and I really needed, I really needed something just unabashedly good to happen. And then this happens and I was so happy. I, ’cause it’s, it’s, I would never buy. A, a skeleton crew flag.
’cause I don’t collect Star Wars flags or anything like that. And I, and the boys were like, like when I showed the boys the young littlest man, he was like, we could hang in the living room. He like pointed to the space above the piano and you are like, let’s hang it up there. And I was like, let’s find a place in the basement to hang it if we’re gonna hang it someplace.
That’s, that’s for our Trump flag.
We, we do have a Star Wars thing hanging in our living room already. Um, and it’s because my wife bought it and it says something like, join the resistance and it has like a, the Phoenix logo on it, like the rebel Phoenix logo on it.
So it’s sort of like a nod to that.
Um. But yeah, we don’t have, we don’t have very much Star Wars stuff on the first floor. Everything is in the basement. And while I would very much like to get a skeleton group poster to add to my rotating poster collection down here, the flag was not on my list or in my awareness of its existence. So I’m very happy that it’ll go up someplace and they’ll send you photos of it when we get it hung up and next time a new Star Wars comes out, hopefully we will, um, be at the premier.
Mm. Yeah, because well, that’s the ladder we’re on now.
Um, yeah. And now we can, , we’re at the premier and we’ll be like, Hey Lindsay, what’s up?
Yeah, yeah. I am. Uh, I’m ex extremely. I’m extremely happy about this development and once again, just thank you Star Wars for sending us this stuff and it, it, it has a good home.
way. Yeah. We just gotta figure out what it is we’re doing right. And what it, so we keep doing that and stop doing whatever we’re doing wrong.
That is the trick. Um, and since, since you started it, we should give each other per quarterly performance reviews. No, you’re not gonna do that.
Hmm. You’re, you’re, you’re, Matt. I, I, we need to talk about your timing of fart jokes.
My lack of improv skills, these metrics, my lack of improv skills, my slowness to edit these episodes, my tendency to have, um, mental health crises had delayed recordings and postings. All of this is poorly reflected in, in the record.
Yeah. So you’re, well, , while we, while we here in management, , appreciate your, , vast knowledge of science, this is a podcast about a sci-fi fantasy, uh, world. And, , real life has no bearing on it.
Stop doing Church It Up with Knowledge. Let’s talk about space Wizards that hit each other with, with, with laser swords.
Okay. Alright. All right. So I think we’re done talking about the Skeleton Crew gift package that we got. By the time this comes out, everyone’s gonna have seen three or four episodes of Skeleton Crew. Um. But that comes out tomorrow and I’m pretty excited. We, we did release our trailer review of it, um, right after we did that trailer review.
And so we have our thoughts in that episode. If you’re curious what we were expecting out of Skeleton Kruger, listen to that episode and see how wrong we were. Um, but did you do any sci-fi or Star Wars this week?
Um, no. I mean, no, not really. Just I, I found a new book to listen, audiobook to listen to, but um, that’s kind of sci-fi, but other than that, nothing.
Oh, I started watching the Dune series mentioned. Did you talk about that last time?
You mentioned it last time. We recorded last week. ’cause we are back to weekly recordings. Um, but you didn’t say much about it other than. You thought it was gonna be about the Beta Jesuit and it probably isn’t that much about
Well, it’s, they are a part of it. Uh, I don’t know how best to describe it. Um, it’s mainly the, the two main groups right now are the benes and the, um, uh, carino, uh, house Carino.
Um, but , there, there is like some outside like elements. Going on as well to make it kind of like, I’m not really sure what’s going on.
You’ve, you only ever see like a couple haron and like one a tradies, , and, and it’s like fresh off of like, it’s only like a hundred or so years after the, the Butler and Jihad. So they’re still very like, , like, I’ll, I’ll just say this. There’s like a kid who has a, this toy robot and pe , and people are like, go insane about it, because they’re just like no thinking machines whatsoever.
Right, right. They wanna just, they don’t
wanna destroy the digital world.
Yeah. And it’s actually, it’s actually kind of in interesting, um, because it’s only like a, like what’s considered a generation. Like how many years
20 something. 20 something like 20 to 25 years is considered a single generation.
So it’s only been like a handful of generations since, um, , since they kind of freed themselves, um, , and, and destroyed all the, the thinking machines. Um, but kind of like in real life there’s people that are already kind of like, eh, do we really need to, , do is having them that bad?
Did we overreact the, so it’s just very much just like in real life, how’s this like. , Like we forget the lessons that our ancestors taught us
Immediately. And ’cause like, like, oh, whooping cough, , uh, polio come, , and they’re really that bad, , , like, uh, here’s,
yeah, here’s, here’s for people who don’t study the history of medicine, um, people used to intentionally infect themselves with milder forms of diseases, uh, before vaccines, even though it put their own lives at risk because they thought that was, it was protecting their children, you know?
And we take that for granted. Yeah. Like, we’re not, we’re not given the choice in between, like harming ourselves or losing a child anymore until we undo all of these. Lifesaving programs.
Yeah. Like even like Washington, like during the Revolutionary War, he, he like, he, um, inoculated the, um, the army by like having them like snort like ground up, like cowpox scabs.
Yeah. That was actually the way they did it back then. That that wasn’t that groundbreaking. Um, that is pretty, yeah. That’s how they did it. Pretty disgusting.
I remember someone showed me when I was taking some microbiology class or some history of medicine class, at some point in college, they had an etching of, of the way they used to inoculate people with cowpox and they had like an infected cow there.
And they were like smearing like children’s faces on like the pustules that are on this cow. Or they would like. Lance them and then wipe it on their face and put it in their mouth and things like that. Mm-hmm. And they’re describing this insanely disgusting process, and the professor said, um, over the past several hundred years, this process has improved to the fact that we do it on the arm instead of the face
ca cowpox, like a vaccinia vaccination. This is the, the virus used for smallpox vaccines. Now, most, most people don’t have them unless you’re old enough to have gotten them. Or you worked in a lab that works with vaccinia or smallpox. Um, it, you basically scrape the skin and then you inoculate the cut, like the irritated cut, basically file your skin down until it’s bleeding and like a little patch the size of a dime.
And then you add. The vaccinia there, and then it turns into a sore. And I had a, I had a colleague whose arms swollen up, got really swollen, and he couldn’t use it. And he went to the doctor, and the doctor’s like, this is a normal reaction. This is considered a normal reaction to this vaccine. Um, but it can be quite painful.
Is is that why like everybody, like who, like they have like, or was it, or was it the polio or they’ve got like the, the scar? No, that’s a small box scar. Yes. That’s, that’s why, that’s why it’s not just like a, like a little needle mark. There’s an actual like scar. Scar,
yeah. It looks like it, it depends on when you had it done, but it can be like the size of a coin.
And it could be usually on your arm. Although some people did it on, like some doctors would do it on people’s backs, so it was less visible.
Yeah, because I think my mother-in-law has one. It’s like on her like, like, uh, upper shoulder or, well, I guess like, like I guess would you consider like shoulder part of your arm that it’s about the size of like,
uh, around a nickel maybe?
Yeah, like a dime. Like probably it’s like I’m looking at photos of them now. There’s, they all look like, yeah, like a diamond to nickel sized thing. But still it’s less scarring than the, the Zs and people got smallpox, a lot of them and ended up blind. So it’s better than that. Alright. Oh yeah. Gotta close a Google search tab that has images of medical stuff on it, I think goes poorly, quickly.
Uh, yeah, I’m, uh, why did I do that?
Well, so we can talk more about. Um, we sort of got Sidetracks, we’re talking about Dune, but I’m gonna start watching that show soon too. Yeah. So maybe, maybe I can catch up and Yeah, we can talk about it, but
Yeah. Yeah. But the, the, the main point is just that I was just saying that it’s just like that I, it is cool that like, even in, , like real life, just like that, like we forget how horrible things were and so we just like, oh, , we kind of like let our guard down on certain things.
Um, , like we’ve got, we, we even do it in just in real life. Like, how many times have you been hung over and sworn that you’re not gonna do that again?
Yeah. I’m, I’m off alcohol currently because of that. I. I drank too much a couple nights ago and I woke up, hung over and I was like, what am I doing?
Like, like I’m a 40 something. I should not be waking up hungover. It’s just a sign that you’re drinking too much. So yeah, I’m very much in that, in that vein right now of not drinking and, and I know I’m going back to it. Don’t worry,
cause of and solution to all of life’s problems.
Yeah. So, but um, anyways, like, so I, I guess dune is probably the most sci-fi thing that I’ve done.
What about, what about you?
I haven’t done much Star Wars this week. I’m still working a lot on R two. That’s, that’s definitely gonna be my winter project. And so. Getting stuff done on R two is a lot of fun. Uh, it’s very rewarding right now. It’s a good mental health activity for me ’cause he’s, I’m making a lot of progress there.
Um, so that’s sort of my Star Wars stuff. I’m not really 3D printing right now. I’m not painting any action figures or doing anything like that. I’m focused pretty much solely on R two and work. Um, but I did, I did make a list of science fiction movies that I’ve missed recently, or science fiction shows that I never finished just due to work and other bullshit family and stuff.
Mm-hmm. And I’m just gonna go back and fill it in. Like, I’ve never finished The Expanse. I think I watched two seasons of it and stopped. Not because I didn’t like it, but I didn’t finish it. So I need to go back and finish that. But I did watch Cowboys and Aliens and I know this is not a good movie. Um, at least there that’s not like.
Science fiction with a message, it’s mm-hmm. Um, Harrison Ford and Daniel Craig playing cowboys that shoot aliens.
Yeah. Didn’t John, wasn’t John John Favreau part of that?
It was, yeah. He was the producer or director of that movie. It came out like in 2012 and it, it’s just one of these things where it had everything that I like in a movie and I just never saw it.
Mm-hmm. I’m sure, because I was a new parent back then and I was just too busy, um, like Yeah. Was still working at the NIH and I had a brand new baby, so.
Yeah. And sometimes things just fly under your radar or you’re just kinda like you are, or you just hear about it and you’re just kinda like. Eh, , and then before it, , , , over 10 years has passed and you’ve never actually bothered to, to see that movie or listen to that album or watch that show.
Yeah. So my wife and I, um, we just didn’t do much on Friday. ’cause it was the Friday after Thanksgiving and we’re just sort of sitting on the couch. And she wanted to watch the movie Women of the Hour, which is like an Anna Kendrick Netflix movie about a serial killer that appears on the dating game back in the seventies.
And like the story of the serial killer. Yeah. It’s a true story.
Oh yeah. Oh yeah. What was, was it, was it Bundy?
No, it wasn’t Bundy. It was a guy named Alcala or something like that. He was wasn’t, it’s not one that you’re gonna know unless you study these people, but he was convicted of killing. Like eight women, but he might have killed like 120 or something.
And he was, he would always pose as like a photographer and he was really young and he would pick up like runaways or something and tell them that he’s gonna take their photo and put them in a magazine, , and then he would just drive out to desert and murder them as one does. As one does. And so this, so it’s a quote unquote true story, you know, inspired by true, true events where he appears on the dating game.
And this sort of aspiring actress is the female trying to pick from bachelor number one, two, and three on the dating game. And he wins the dating game, quote unquote wins the dating game. And then she refuses to go on a date with him ’cause she gets creeped out by him. And then in the movie. Like he comes after her, but that might not have happened in real life, but this guy’s a real piece of work.
Oh yeah, he wasn’t like, he was like, I don’t say he’s great looking, but he wasn’t like, but he wasn’t, he wasn’t like, Ooh. I mean, serial killers are
charming people, you knows. Yeah. For
the, for the, for the seventies, you know?
Yeah. So we watched that movie and it was good. I liked it. I like crime thriller sort of things, and so does my wife.
And then she didn’t want to do anything and that she’s like, like, do you want to like, do anything else or just wanna start watching, keep watching tv. And she’s like, let’s just find another movie. And I was just scrolling through and I was like, oh, Cowboys and aliens, can we watch this? ’cause I, we didn’t, I didn’t want something heavy and it delivered Cowboys and Aliens is a very entertaining movie.
And Olivia Wilde is in it. And that’s always fun. Can’t I can’t go wrong with Olivia Wilde. Yeah. And Harrison Ford and Daniel Craig are the main characters. It is a extremely satisfying movie, let’s put it that way. No, no big surprises. No crazy message Aliens, bad cowboys good, ? Mm-hmm. And what’s his name?
Is it Clancy? Uh, Clancy Brown. Clancy Brown. He was in Rebels, right? Uh, yeah. He was also in the Mandalorian. Right? He plays. He plays the governor of, uh, Al, right? Yeah. He’s
also the, um, uh, he’s also in the jailbreak episode. He plays the, um, oh, I can’t, I can’t think of the name of the, the species now. Dros? No, not Ro.
Um, the ones with the, um, that kinda look like the Devils
Wait, he was the Devonian in the jail breakup episode of Mandalorian. Mm-hmm. Yep. Amazing. So he plays preacher in, in, um, alien cowboys and aliens. And so that was fun to see him too. Yeah.
Yeah. He’s, um, God, he’s in tons of stuff I was talking about earlier.
He was in, uh, carnival. ’cause we were talking about before about how like, like, like shows that they’re just like really good and then they just end. Yeah. Yeah. He’s, he’s in a ton of stuff.
Yeah, I’m on his very distinct voice on his IM DB page. Yeah, go ahead.
Yeah. He was 340 credits on his IMDB page and he appears in 277 episodes of SpongeBob.
Yeah. This guy, this guy’s awesome. Yeah, so it was fun to see him and yeah, I didn’t realize that he was, um, the Devonian. That’s cool. Anyway, so I didn’t do much else sci-fi or Star Wars this week. Um, I think we’ve got a pretty cool episode to go over. So, do you wanna, do you wanna get into that? Oh
my God, he was in Moonwalker.
What’s Moonwalker? The Michael Jackson movie. Have I missed
Oh, it a, you know, smooth criminal. Um, it was very, very weird.
Um, yeah. Uh, alright, now I’m going back to the eighties to figure out what else he’s been in.
He was in, uh, uh, the first Highlander.
his first credit is Dukes of Hazard and Bad Boys. I don’t know what bad boys is.
Yeah, he’s so cool. I guess I need to watch Moonwalker.
Don’t, let’s not go crazy.
I’m gonna add it to our list.
It’s gonna, it’s gonna, it’s like, uh, captain EO level of
uh, so I’ve seen Captain eo ’cause I. Like I, I, I saw a Disney land in California when I was a kid, back when Michael Jackson and Disney had a good relationship, um, where they had to cut ties with him.
Revenge of the Nerds three, the next generation.
Oh, that’s good. Anyway, uh, do you wanna move on to the show?
Yeah, I suppose we should. You
wanna keep reading his IMDD page? Yeah,
I mean, I could do that all night, but yeah. I think people are, I downloaded and if they’re still listening, they want to hear about Star Wars. Yeah. They’re championing it.
The bit to, to hear our, our takes on, uh, whether or not Satine and OB one, um, did it.
Yes. Alright, just a second. Yes.
Like see the, this episode and into the next one. There’s, it starts to get a little, ooh,
they’ve got some sitcom bickering sort of stuff going on.
Um, all right. I didn’t do plot. I didn’t do cast, and you’re gonna take the plot this week. So do you want to start with Fortune cookie?
Yeah. So the, uh, fortune cookie is, if you’ve ignored the past, you jeopardize the future. We’ll get into that, uh, later. But yeah, this one, this one definitely is like on the nose. Others are more ambiguous where like, maybe, maybe it could apply. This is very much on the nose.
Yeah, we’re, we are definitely, like, this is a very on point, um, fortune cookie.
It might as well have said, do it January 6th. And bad things will happen.
Yeah. Uh, who um, who is it that succeeded on, um, Lincoln?
Um, who, who, who is his vice president? Johnson. Yeah.
Johnson. Yeah. It was very much a Johnson to me was like, eh, we’re just gonna forgive everybody.
Yeah. Instead of Andrew, Andrew Johnson.
That was actually, that was actually Ta Esby Tilden, which was the presidential election in 1876, I think, where they basically said you we’re ending reconstruction if you just let the Republican win the presidency in the South. It’s like, all right, cool. Yeah. So no, no penalty for like the Civil War. Cool.
But yeah, Johnson was a jerk. John Johnson was a confederate sympathizer almost.
Mm. Yeah. That or , , let, or, , taking the, taking the Nazis you want and then, , putting them in NASA or, , other programs, but hey, whatever. But Project Paperclip.
Mm-hmm. Should, have you ever heard that Vernor Ron v Brown song?
No. Oh, I gotta find it. Alright, why don’t you start the thing,
did I ever tell you about like, the, the thing with him and, I mean, maybe, maybe I said it on the podcast before that, like, I was listening to Science Friday, this was like years ago, and there’s some author on there, um, who had written a book about, uh, um, Von Braun.
And, um, this woman calls in because it’s Science Friday with Ira Glass. I ha no, not Ira
Yeah, sorry. And I think, yeah, I’m pretty sure because you were, you did a impression of him, but yeah, she called in saying that, yeah, he’s a Nazi. Um, , my grandfather saw him do really bad stuff, , at the camp.
And like this author was trying to like, well, , he wasn’t like, it’s like, no, he was there, like, he confronted him like after the war, , his, , remarks or, , like his, his history is written down and the wherever is it, the how, wherever they did their, , everybody gave their, um, record of what, um, what had happened to them.
But, um, yeah. But anyways, long story short, you, if you ignore the past, you jeopardize the future. I’m gonna, don’t go soft. Don’t go soft on, uh, Confederates play this song.
Gather round while I sing you a Werner fun brown. A man whose allegiance is ruled by expedience. Call him a Nazi. He won’t even frown. Nazi sch Nazi Says Werner. Fun brown.
Don’t say that he’s hypocritical. Say rather that he’s apolitical. Once the rockets are up, who cares where as I come down. So that’s not my department says Vanner van.
It’s, he’s a comedian, Tom Laer. Um, yeah, I think, I think it’s just a joke. ’cause he, he wrote that in the fifties. I, um, yeah. Anyway, let’s stop talking about Verna Ron Brown and talk about Manor Dead.
Yeah. Screw him. Okay. So the Council of Neutral Systems, which represents about 1500 planets and systems are trying to stay out of the war.
The leader of this council that just satine from Mandal Lord, is secretly building an army to support the separatists. OB one is sent to Mandalah to investigate this rumor. So Kenobi lands in a spaceport, uh, and a manor es sorry, a Mandalorian escort is there waiting for him. Uh, they speed off to the palace.
Obiwan enters a large halt where he meets Prime Minister Alek. Geez, this guy has a long neck. I never really realized it. It it’s
sorry. Yeah, it’s, it’s wild how long his neck is. Um, so they exchanged some pleasantries. Alek tells Obiwan the Duchess Satine supports peace, that they would never betray the Republic before I go on like, like I think everybody knows now like what?
, Like kind of mandal looks like, but Mandal is like a desolate, like, it’s, it’s just like, it’s just like all like desert except for like these huge mega structure. It’s like almost kinda like think like judge dread sort of, except like all in, like encompassed in like, like these domes. Um, or just everything just jam packed together.
’cause I guess they’ve just, they’ve fucked the environment so much that, that they have to live, , um, in these, in these huge domed, , structures.
Yeah, we can talk about sort of the design of, um, the design of mandal, but, but I think I wanna do that later. Um, because this is our first, our first view of Mandal and Mandal in the Mandalorian is.
A waste is like a ruin and we don’t quite get, um, this is when we see it at the height of it, I guess is what I’m trying to say.
Yeah. It um, it makes me think a lot of, uh, did you ever see the, uh, remake of Total Recall?
No. It’s, no, it’s got some interesting things in it, like, um, some cool, like technologies and whatnot, but like, like some of like the cities, like, because there’s like only like two, there’s only like two cities in it, and they’re just, they’re, it’s just all over the place.
They’re built from the ceiling down, , it’s all over the place. It’s not like, just like from the ground up. It’s almost like how like a, like you would expect like an ant colony or like a B colony or something, or , just like the, um, these Mandalorian. It’s like cities or whatever it is. It’s just, they’re just, they’re all over the place.
It’s, it’s kind of, it’s very, a wild, it’s a very wild, like haphazard design.
Um, I wanna watch total recall with the boys. Maybe you could watch the old one in the new one, but that sounds like a cool design.
Yeah. But, but what I’m talking about like with, like with Manor? Yes. The, it’s just, yeah, it’s just like, it’s like all over the place.
It’s like a Mc Escher painting.
Right. So we can, I wanna hold off on the painting stuff, because you’re right, that is inspired by a painting style. Um, and I, I like the idea that it’s an Escher painting ’cause it’s just, you’re talking about like the paradoxical, like staircases to nowhere sort of paintings.
Yeah. Um, and I can definitely see that in this. I’m looking at the concept art for Mandal. Um, but let’s talk about painting later because there’s two. Paintings in the background of this episode, one of Satine and one in, um, governor Villa’s office, and I wanna talk about them separately.
Okay. Right. Um, I noticed the one in, in her office.
notice the one in his, they’re both Picasso paintings adapted to the Star Wars style, but we’ll talk about that later.
Yeah. So even though Mandal has a violent past, all their warriors were sent to a moon. They all died off years ago. We, one asks if that’s true since he just met Django Fat and attacked Theones and he wore Mandalorian armor.
Nik seems insulted. He says Django Fat was a bounty hunter and not a Mandalorian.
Yeah. Stop bringing up Jingo Fed every time you get a chance. He’s just a simple man trying to make his way in the universe.
Yeah, yeah. And he’s, yeah, he’s trying to get ahead in the universe. Ah,
there you go. There you go. So he was decapitated,
Um, but I just want, now granted, , with a lot of Star Wars, , that the, , the, um, stuff in like Rebels and the Mandalorian TV series, , hadn’t really been. , Maybe just slight concepts in, in the back of, , Phil’s mind, but this doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Like, can you imagine like, like the United States?
Yeah. So, so like, so imagine the us we elect like a, like a pacifist president, , and like thises everybody that this is the way to go. We’re gonna try something new because we didn’t, , like we’ve been at war, , forever. And so we just send all the military away. Or at least maybe the people who don’t want to disarm, but it’s, but he says all their warriors.
So we take, but so that would assume like everybody who is a warrior, it’s just like, okay, you’re out. , Get lost.
Yeah. We’re, we’re gonna be peaceful. , It doesn’t seem like something that they would just be like, okay, it seems more like, like, like, oh, you’re a pacifist.
I’m a warrior. Um, I’m in charge now. ’cause you’re not gonna fight back.
Yeah. It, it’s, I think they’re just trying to establish how drastic a cultural shift is it going on here? Because there’s lots of moments we’ll get to a couple moments later where they’re like, where OB one’s like, well the mandalorians used to fight Jedi and they all seem offended.
They’re like, how dare you?
So like talking to somebody whose dad was a Nazi
or, or bringing up like, like Japan once invaded China. They’re like, we don’t talk about that anymore. Yeah. How dare you bring up Na.
Yeah, yeah. All that bad stuff we did. How dare you. So it, so there, there’s obviously been some sort of cultural shift and I’m guessing it’s just the one they expelled, the ones who just would not conform.
Um, yeah. They asked everybody, do you wanna be a baker? And they’re like, can I still kill people? And they’re like, go to the moon.
Yeah. But yeah, so I, I, I’m assuming it’s those who just would not, they would not put down their arms, , they were able to, they were, they’re obviously not that passive, , or pacifist that they were able to expel all the warriors and then they think that they’ve just, like, they killed each other, , they, they died out either like killing each other or just, , their, their way died out.
So, but I, so it has to have been a recent thing because looking back on it, um, uh, Boca talks about like being like, like taking the creed. And she would, and she would’ve been trained. That’s not something that like, , like, was like satine, like trained as well? Did she take like the, did she take the creed?
But she just, but she just is because when she inherited the throne, she’s just like, this isn’t working. We need to, we need to change.
I mean, Obie one says that when they’re on their walk, we haven’t gotten there yet, but he says that Mandal Lori’s changed drastically since the last time he’s been there.
It feels like a really recent thing.
Yeah. So yeah, it’s very, yeah, it just, it’s just seems strange and maybe it’s just coming from, , since we both live in a country that’s like, like pretty much like worships the military, um, and , like we have a humongous military, it just seems like it weird that they’re able to like purge them peacefully.
Um. So, uh, satin enters and she calls Obiwan her Jedi and shining armor, which he kind of is ’cause he’s actually wearing armor. Um, so she’s insulted that he would think that she was plotting against the republic. Obiwan tells him that a separatist saboteur attacked one of their cruisers and he was dressed like a mandalorian.
We don’t see this attack. Do we just, we just see,
yes, we see the report, we see this attack.
Yeah. They, they show the, uh, like a hollow of him. Uh, the sky’s, the sky is dressed in Mandalorian armor and, , and he’s using it. And you, like he fires off a rocket at one point.
Yeah. I mean, we don’t, we don’t see what the plot, this isn’t a plot in another episode.
Right. This is just something that Obi one is showing them. Yes. It’s not like, it’s not like we’re, we were, this was set up before.
Oh yeah. No, no. This is, this was something that just happened. They’re just, oh, we have this recording of this thing that happened, but it wasn’t part of any previous episode.
Yeah. And then like Muck says that he’s mistaken. It was like, um, did you just not see the video? It’s like, , man, let’s play the video again. Mandalorians are not a violent people and it’s very much like, uh, yeah, you are, um. It’s like, it’s like, okay, I can, I can appreciate, , like, okay, that’s not who we are anymore.
That’s like me, , like when dealing with people who I used to hang out with in my past when we used to go out and party and just cause trouble and it’s like, and , like, and they’re talking to me like, I’m still that person. It’s like, no, that’s not who I am anymore. I don’t want to be known, , , as, as, as that person anymore.
So I can, , I could appreciate them if they, , if, if it was written more like that. Like saying like, yeah, I get it. , It’s kind of, kind of embarrassing. We used to be, have this huge warrior culture thing that really just was. , I could understand why you wouldn’t believe that we’ve changed, but we have.
But instead they’re just going straight, like, oh, we would never do that. Yeah. And it’s like your history says otherwise. Yeah. Strains credulity for sure. Yeah. Yeah. You’ve, yeah. You’ve, you have, um, you made weapons specifically to fight Jedi. Um, so OB one points out the mandalorians fought in many wars and usually against the Jedi.
Just like I just said. , Satine and Almac get more upset. Satine accuses accused the senate of corruption and pressure on mandal to enter the war. On the Republic’s side, everyone says the Jedi sent him, not the Republic satin apologizes and asks if he would join her for a walk around the city.
Yeah, I’m sure. I’m sure he had to volunteer real hard.
Yeah, he, uh, yeah, there’s clearly I’m, we get a lot of this in the coming episodes and then they actually almost explicitly state it. Um. In a later, much later episode that he had a physical relationship with her. Um, but there’s, it’s immediately obvious that there’s this sort of relationship tension between them.
Like they have a secret. They clearly have a secret, and they’re not telling anybody. Mm-hmm.
Yeah. So the, um, so they go for a walk and once they’re alone, it’s clear that there’s some sort of history. Uh, Mandelo is prosperous. Uh, satin tells Obiwan that there’s a breakaway group called Death Watch who promote the old violent ways of Mandal or. Satine says that they’re just punks who just vandalize public spaces.
Death Watch is based on the moon of Concordia. Satine says that they will deal with death, death watch soon enough. Now, before I continue, I want to go back to kind of like, did you notice that like, there, there was some like, um, like plants in the background and how they were, um, how they were, um, how they were trimmed?
No, I didn’t notice. It was very boxy in kind of similar fashion to how like the Mandalorian like, I dunno if there was ever given a name for that city, but just like, it very much looks kinda like the structure, like the, uh, how the city’s structured with just blocks and kind of haphazard, , patterns.
So I thought that was very. I think that was very purposeful on, on their part to make it, um, it, it’s more of just like a, that’s just kind of a Mandalorian
thing, you know? Yeah. I think that’s probably incredibly intent, intentional. You know, you have a peaceful society when you invest in topiary.
Right? You gotta have those nice gardens.
Yeah. So cut to the moon. Uh, to the moon. Concordia a Mandalorian in Full Armor is talking to Count Duku saying, Duku promised death. Watch support. If they could destabilize the Mandalorian government, Duku says he’ll keep his promise. The Mandalorian is worried that if the Republic is putting pressure on Satins government death watch will not be able to take over the government death.
Watch tells him that if there are troops sent there, people will rally behind him in a sort of nationalistic way, which, , makes, makes sense. It’s not a
terrible plan. Right. No Force Republics to put troops on the ground and then say, look who’s invading us now.
Even though, even though they’ll be wearing those powder blue like robin eggshell blue peacekeeping helmets from the un, it still doesn’t matter.
So, uh, back on the walk with OV one and Satine, they’re arguing about the practicality of passive resistance when a bomb goes off, uh, in a park, there’s people hurt. OB one says that this isn’t just vandalism or punks. Satine says the attack must be from an off world earth since no Mandalorian would do this.
But then there’s the sign of death watch is projected in the middle of the explosion.
Satina, her reaction to this couldn’t have possibly been a mandalorian is a form of racism that, uh. Like some form of like severe prejudice. That is incredible. Like she is literally like picking rubble out of her hair and she’s like, well, Mandalorian couldn’t have done this.
Yeah, you’re a fucking mandal lawyer. Who else is here? Yeah.
It’s kind of like the, , um, it’s, it’s a foreigners that did
this. It’s the foreigners,
yes. Foreign immigrants. Um, yeah, the immigrants from Concordia built a wall around Concordia and make the, make death watch pay for it. But no, it’s the, um, I mean maybe like Mandalorian as, as like a creed as in like, they wouldn’t have.
Uh, , like true Mandalorians wouldn’t have done it then that’s kind, then you get into the kind of like the No true Scotsman Yeah. Sort of fallacy that’s just like, but it’s just like, yeah, they’ve proven that they don’t give a shit.
It just, it’s just incredible to me how quickly Satine throws the immigrants under the bus here.
Yeah. Because I think she, I think this episode shows, um, that she is way over her head and she is, yep. And she is just clinging to this idea that doesn’t exist.
Um, yeah, she, she had a lot of success reforming society, but she didn’t actually change them. Yes. It was all window dressing and there. Violent nature is still there and it’s coming back at her.
Yeah. So, yeah. But she, , she, yeah. It’s, it’s, it’s very, this is kind of very poignant. Um, it’s weird how relevant it is that it’s just like, yeah, this, like things have been good, but like, have they been good? Just because you just haven’t really been looking. Right for the bad. You’ve just been seeing what you want to see.
And, and I think that’s very much true with her. , Like she, she was able, , they helped reform society, but they didn’t, , like they didn’t acknow, they, they’re not acknowledging their warrior. Past, they’re just, they, they kind of like got rid of all of them. ? They, they, they, they just purged all of them.
Um, or, or not even say purged. They just, um, they sent them, , they, they exiled them and two, the moon that’s right near them. Uh, so it’s just like they, they didn’t really deal with the problem.
All right, let’s keep going. We’re, we’re getting really long in the recording and we’re not very far to the episode.
Okay. Okay. Um, Satine is rushed off and Obi one wants to question everyone present, uh, and so a man starts to run away and o ob one gives Chase. They run through a tunnel and onto a rooftop. OB one says he only wants to talk. The man pulls a blaster and shoots at Obiwan. They tussle, but the man kills himself after chanting something in the Mandalorian language.
Now this is actually a real shame that they don’t use the language in the Mandalorian TV show.
Yeah. I, I wish I would have the patience to translate what he said and what she said to him, but I ran out of time and it’s not typically the activity I would waste my time doing, but it’s a very interesting language.
Yeah. Um, it’s cool. And, and, and this happens a lot in this episode, but it’s like, where are Satine security forces? I mean, she has like these guards that follow her around, but there’s no like, security forces. There’s like no local cops or anybody that’s willing to do anything other than obiwan.
We see, we see Mandalorian police later, but not in this episode.
Yeah. I. So Satine is on site and she approaches the man as he lies dying. He’s still speaking in, in Mandalorian. Oh, we want to ask what he’s saying. She says she’s speaking in a dialect that is spoken on the moon of Concordia. She speaks the language back to the dying man.
So, yeah. So this, this has to be like, like send up like red flags.
Yeah. This is a kid show and a guy kills himself on it, but yeah. But yes, this has to be. This has to be one of these moments where it’s like, like, maybe I am in over my head, maybe I’ve over underestimated what’s going on here because there was a bomb.
It’s clearly a Mandalorian that did it. And rather than be captured, he kills himself.
Yeah. Yeah. They, they’ve been, they’ve been cracking down hard on the, um, the, the left wing of the, uh, of Mandalorian political culture and have completely ignored death watch.
exactly. Because like, oh, they’re harmless.
Meanwhile, , like they, , they just had their Timothy McVay, uh, blows something up and then kill himself.
Okay, so, uh, obiwan says he wants to go to this moon. Satine says, for many reasons, he cannot go alone, and she will accompany him. They argue, but it’s not working. Satine is going to the moon with Obiwan. She says that now that Obiwan is involved in the death of a concordian, that it’s going, it’s going to be a little too dangerous.
We, one reminds her that he didn’t kill him. She says she knows that, but it won’t matter.
She gets a little protective here, which makes me think she did take the creed because this is a Mandalorian warrior who just died, and she is acting upset even though this guy probably is the bomber. Mm-hmm. Because she’s like, he’s like, I didn’t like to remind you I didn’t kill him.
And she’s like, that’s, I know, that’s why I’m still talking to you. It’s like, like you, you clearly have not addressed this cultural problem at all. Mm-hmm. You yourself, hold this warrior. In reverence. Yeah.
And just, and just the fact that she has to, that she acknowledges that like, um, they’re not gonna like you if you go there alone.
, They’re, they may not, they may just kill you on site.
Um, it seems like that’s what she’s implying,
so it’s just like, yeah. So it’s just like, um. So it was like, so are you peaceful or are you not? Because I would think that a peaceful society really wouldn’t have, , you wouldn’t have to worry about people just randomly killing people, uh, who may have been involved
with somebody else’s death.
Yeah. We’re peaceful people. All right, cool. I’m gonna go to this moon. No, no. They’ll fla you.
Yeah. Yeah. It’s, , peaceful except for, , all the honor killings. There you go.
Let’s not lean into that anymore. No, let’s keep going.
Yeah. Maybe we just wanna cut that part out. Um, so on the moon, um, they, uh, they survey the landscape and get the agricultural history of the moon.
They land in a city and they’re greeted by Governor Vila, the leader of Concordia, the man in charge of finding death. Watch. This is like that, uh, FBI guy who was on the take from the, from the Russians. Yeah. That’s a great movie too. Who is, who is in charge of finding people who are on the take from the Russians?
Yeah. Fucking amazing. I, I don’t remember the name of that movie, but I’m gonna look it up right now ’cause I love that movie. I, funny,
funny stuff. Um, but, uh, yeah, so, um, but the one thing that I was just very, that struck me about this, um, okay, well, okay, let me just finish this off. So they exchanged some small talk and then Vila asks if he can see the body of the man who did the bombing.
When Vila and the others leave Obiwan ask Satine to distract Vila at dinner while Obiwan snoops around some old minds to see if they’re still active. Where the hell is Mandal Lord’s intelligence agencies?
They were exiled to the moon.
They don’t have anything like an F-B-I-A-C-I-A, Homeland Security, , like sheriff’s department or something. , They don’t have like narcs, , like they don’t have anybody, like, they’ve gotta do the investigating themselves. Like how has this society not already fallen to death watch?
I think, I think we’re, we’re not understanding the timescale here.
I think the society is basically falling to death watch right now. And it’s so, it’s so, they’re so weak that this handful of warriors can topple an entire government. It’s very scary.
But it just seems like, like why would they, why would, like, okay, like even, like even if they, , they, they got rid of the extremists. There’s. Unless it’s just like she does, she like, pretty much like, think like, like, like, like maybe like maybe kinda like the problem that we have here with, , um, nationalists and whatnot being, , like having sympathetic elements inside of our own intelligence agencies and law enforcement agencies and military to where like, who
This is a, this is a, this is a problem with her naivete. We learn, we learn in future episodes like how naive she is, right? So we’re gonna have to go down this path with her because she’s surrounded by people who aren’t supporting her.
Yeah. So you’d be surprised that they let it get this far and, and, and this.
Other, I mean, uh, I, I’ll, I’ll, I’ll get through, I’ll get through some of this, but there’s, there’s more I want to, to talk on this.
We, we also have more episodes of this, of Satin coming up. We have two more episodes. Right,
right. But this is, , like this is kind of setting up the Mandal stuff. So I, I do wanna talk a little bit more about that, but, all right.
Let’s start through the notes. Yeah, so Satine tells Obiwan that since he’s her guest here, he should tread lightly and that she doesn’t support his snooping. He speeds off towards the abandoned mines on a speeder. So cut to Satine, Satine, and Illa is writing the family of the, the bombing a letter saying, good job, though Satin thinks that this is a, a proper idea.
She says, Kenobi will join them shortly. He’s meditating. I don’t know why they, would she think this is a good idea? Like, other than like, yeah, I don’t know why he did this. Sorry for your loss.
It’s, it’s more of this respect for the warrior bullshit. Mm-hmm. Like
Yeah. So, , like if we’re going off of, , just like this, not just, it’s just crap writing, but instead it’s like just making her out to just, just being like, she’s just completely, , like she knows that there’s the, the whole warrior, she, she has this cognitive, um, di is dissonance.
Cognitive dissonance where she knows the warrior culture is alive and well. Yeah. It’s even alive and well in her. Yeah. But she won’t, she won’t outwardly admit it. Um, , while, while she won’t actually, , like take action and, , kill somebody because, , they looked at her the wrong way or , or whatever.
I, . She might be honor bound to do, um, , as a warrior, she still kind of has that kind of, that background that, uh, that, um, she was raised a certain way. So she’s still gonna be, act certain ways, , in regards to like their, their warrior culture. But she know, like, so then she, she, so then she thinks that like, well, that everybody’s just kind of fighting this internal struggle then.
No, I think that that’s something that I think we’ve, everybody in the real world’s learned the hard way. Some people aren’t struggling, they’re just. They’re not pretending at all. , There’s, there is no struggle. They’re pieces of shit and wanna be pieces of shit, , they want to do bad things, , just because you feel bad about thinking bad things doesn’t mean other people feel bad about doing bad things.
So, um, obiwan is pulling up to the mine. He goes inside and travels down a long shaft. The mine looks abandoned and it appears operational owner. Is there, is this a best car? Mine?
I assume so. I, there was no, there was no indication in the show that it was, but I’ll see if they, if they say in the Wikipedia.
So there’s several Mandalorian helmets on a bench. Um, and the OB one is attacked by a Mandalorian OB one identifies himself and he says he’s there with Satine. The Mandalorian says they don’t recognize her rule. Ob one’s lightsaber is knocked out of his hand, and he’s punched a few times before falling down.
So I wa so seeing kind of like the, the, um, the Mandalorian armor, um, and like, and gear kind of all stashed, or not stashed, but like, kind of like in like more of a storage area just makes me wonder to like, like, uh, is like handing down, , like family armor something for like rich people.
Yeah. Or I bet, I bet it is like houses, , these people don’t necessarily have houses.
They’re, they’re grunts. Yeah, so they get to make armor, but all of that armor had to be manufactured at some point, right?
So maybe these are like new, like try to reestablish their family name by cozying up to death watch. Yeah. So I hear,
, Here’s some armor and then you just, , eventually, , like it will get customized and whatnot as, as it’s used and banged up and whatnot.
And, um, but for here, you just get the generic death watch armor. Um, so back with Satine, she asked Ula if he knows who could benefit from the lies being told to the Senate about mandal or being controlled by death watch, and raising an army to betray the republic. Ula says Death watch is responsible.
Satina is confused. She doesn’t understand why the separatists are targeting her and her government. Ula reminds her that she leads the Council of Independence Systems. And is that the name of it? I thought that’s the name of the separatists.
think it was Coun. Council of Neutral
Yeah. She leaves the Council of Neutral Systems and she represents a threat to them. It’s not a bad thing that they want her dead or disposed. It means that she’s effective. So back of the mind. OB one is captured and hanging upside down. A couple of mandalorians are discussing what to do next. One goes and checks her for other Jedi, they’re waiting for someone to arrive.
Kind of, uh, they did like the commander, one of the mandalorians says that OB one Kenobi that he has, uh, OB one Kenobi’s Lightsaber OB one uses his communicator to tell Satine what’s going on. So Satine can hear Obiwan in her earpiece, but she’s also continuing her conversation with sla. SLA suggests they start dinner without Kenobi.
Kenobi says she needs to come get him, and he’s been captured by Death Watch. She can track him with her commune. Satine makes excuses until she leaves that dinner with SLA and head towards Kenobi. Um, yeah, this is
once again, just like, why are you doing this? Yeah. Why? She’s the president of a planet and she’s doing like a, like spycraft.
Mm-hmm. Doesn’t make any sense.
Yeah. You would think that there’s like some sort of like secret service who are just like, does this, maybe not Secret service, the best example, but just like, um, some sort of like pretorian guard that are just, they are loyal. To the family to a fault. Like they will, , jump in front of a blaster.
, Like, , if, , if they’re, , still in their warrior ways and they say like, kill that guy. They would just kill him. , Like you would think that she would have people like dedicated, like to the family who are just so incredibly loyal, you know?
Yeah. I think we get, I think we get a version of that in a later episode, but it’s definitely not present now.
Yeah. But Yeah, but it’s definitely, you would think that they have that, that they would have somebody, but like, Hey, I’m a, I, , I, I, I really don’t like, um, I really don’t like this pacifist way as I’m a, I’m a terrorist and I’m really interested in adjoining death watch. Uh, I was trying to do my best impression of, uh, team America where he is just like, I’m a terrorist.
Oh, sorry, I didn’t get it. It’s all right. It’s bad, but just like, , just like trying to like, send some people to, um, infiltrate. Um, but, uh, whatever. So, so the mandalorians start, one of the machines that smashed the rocks into ore, all the ones in the, uh, one of the energy fields used to hold the rocks in place.
And he’s about to be smashed into ore. Satine triggers an alarm at the entrance and the mandalorians rush off to check on that. Satine goes into the room where Obiwan is about to be smashed. She barely gets the machine off. In time the Mandalorians return and grab her. She kicks a barrel into the grinning gears and Obiwan escapes for the mining equipment.
This is another example of where like the force is only used when it’s convenient to the plot.
Yeah. It doesn’t make any sense. Everyone could’ve turned off the machine using the force, but , they had to have their sitcom banter. Mm-hmm. Where she’s like, she’s like, I’m going as fast as I can. Not fast enough, you know?
But yeah, it’s fine. It’s a good show. Yeah.
So Obiwan and Satine escape and go into a lift. The lift, uh, door opens and there’s another Mandalorian standing outside. He gets knocked out by Obiwan, like, once again, like we talked before, like that, they’re able to like punch battle droids. Yeah. And stuff like, it’s just like, you would think like, like even if it wasn’t best car, which supposedly like super strong, you know, just like punching, like say like a medieval knight with your bare fist.
Um, but maybe like, , like adding like the force to it. So it’s actually just the force is using the force is actually the thing making contact that I don’t know. But um, so they’re now in a quarry and there are silver armed mandalorians all firing at Obiwan and Satine O ob one does not have his lightsaber, so the two have to run three mandalorians with jet packs come at Obiwan and Satine o ob one uses a blaster and shoots one down, and then detonates a fuel canister in the air, uh, to disorient the remaining two.
A Mandalorian lands near their position and Satine hits him in the helmet with a rock. Obiwan then kicks him over a ledge after he attacks Satine. Obiwan is worried about Satine, but she’s fine. The leader of death Wash says he will handle this and orders the rest of. Of the men take into their ships and take off while he approaches OB one and Satine.
One of the mandalorians who are overpowered by Obi one is getting up the leader of Death watch, calls him a failure and kills him on the spot and death wash proceeds. Um, I wanted to say one thing. They’re, they’re using the, the Mandalorian type pistols that we see, like, um, Sabine use. Yeah. How the heck do you aim
Yeah, that’s a good question. They’re they’re very block, they’re very boxy.
Yeah. They like, um, anybody who’s, , like has like a passing familiarity with firearms, , like you have a front site and you have a back site, even like pistols. So you can, you can aim because, or else you don’t really know, where you’re gonna, , where, where you’re exactly aiming.
If it’s just like a smooth, like, and so it’s. And they mean they’re cool looking pistols, but it doesn’t, doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Maybe this is why O OB
one says that a blaster is random.
Because that they don’t have the two sites on them.
Yeah. So OB one sees the leader has OB one’s lightsaber as the leader approaches Satine and OB one.
He removes his helmet to reveal that it is Governor Vila. He’s the leader of Death Watch pre-vis SLA goes on to say that for many generations his ancestors fought proudly against the Jedi. He says that Sine tarnishes, the name Mandalorian. Previs throws obiwan his lightsaber, and obiwan ignites it.
Previs pulls out the dark saber and says that this weapon was stolen from the Jedi temple centuries ago and was once yielded by his ancestor. They fight.
This is the debut of the dark saber. Yes. Everybody. This is the first time you see the dark saber and it becomes obviously a huge plot point in the Mandalorian.
It shows up in rebels. This, this, this weapon has history and we’re gonna get into the history in a different episode. I don’t wanna talk about it today because, because, but they talk about the, the history later and then it’s more explicitly discussed in rebels I think. But this, this, this is a very cool lightsaber.
It, it was something very new, very unique. It’s something we hadn’t seen before.
Yeah. It’s, I’ve, , I’ve kind of like have like my own like head canon of how like lightsabers work and like how they, um, how they’re not just like, just going on forever. Um, , like if something that’s just emitting like energy that, , why are they, um, why do they have, why is it discrete?
Yeah. Why, why isn’t it just like a big long, , just, just keep on go, , like you pointed it up at the sky and it just, just keeps on going for infinity. , Like, why is it stop, , , why is it only like a couple meters long? , Like a, like a sword. I, I have my own head cannon in there.
So then when the dark saber is introduced, it’s very just much like, well, shoot, I don’t know.
Right. I mean, we see variations of light saber more like we see whips and things like, um. What’s her face as a whipped Vern? Yeah. Vern. Um, and this, this light saber has a shape to it. Um, it’s like a, I don’t know what you call it, but like a scabbard.
Um, it’s got, it’s got a point and then like a bevel to it. Mm-hmm. It’s not just a tube. It’s, it’s a really interesting weapon.
Yeah. And the fact that it’s black and it has kinda like the white, um, energies, whatever’s going on there. Yeah. I, I always like, probably like my head cannon for the dark saber was that it was made like, like best car was used, uh, like in its, um, in its components.
That’s why it’s, that’s why it’s black. Like the, the energy that it emits was is, is black.
Yeah. I always thought before we got the Mandalorian. Episodes about the black saber dark saber that that lights saber couldn’t pierce best car, but maybe the dark saber could. But that clearly isn’t the case, that it’s still bes car.
It’s still PEs car still is resistant to it. But I think we’re gonna talk a lot about the dark saber. Yeah. Um, let’s keep going ’cause we All right, we’ve gotta finish the notes.
Okay. So, um, so pre-vis is trained, but he’s no match for, uh, in a light saber fight with Obiwan ob one uses the force to push him away and disarms him.
Previs is a better hand to hand fighter and they fight some more. And pre-visit uses his jet pack. But ob one causes him to crash by wrestling. Midair pre-visit tells his warriors to finish him and they fire rockets off their packs in his direction. He dodges, but the rockets turn and start coming back at him.
Obiwan and Satine jump into the elevator shaft rather than face. The rockets pre SLA tells him, tells his men not to pursue them, that they’ll catch up with the duchess soon enough. Back with Obiwan and Satine, they trade bars about who rescued who back on Mandal. Laura. Satan’s advisors are saying that since ULA fled, they cannot figure out how Big Death watch is.
OB one says it’s obvious that death Watch is being supported by the separatists. Satine takes great offense to the statement and starts arguing that she’ll never join the war. No matter how much pressure, uh, the Senate and the Jedi put on her. And it can shows up to Escort Obiwan home. And he gets in a couple of lines about obiwan looking tired and they fly off the end, which I wonder because like death watch at some point they’re fighting the separatists because they rescued, uh, Dejan.
Um, yeah, I don’t, that’s a really good point. I didn’t think of, I have a hard time understanding Death watches motivation except wasn’t den on Concordia.
Yeah, you said And so it’s an inva Yeah, it’s an invading force. And so they’re gonna, it’s part, go ahead.
Sorry. Well, I mean, like, he was brought to Concordia and that’s where he was trained that, um, that he, um, that it was part of their fighting corps.
So by this time, like, like, like, like, um, so probably by the time that they come around that they’ve just, like, they’ve abandoned the, um, um, they’ve, they’ve abandoned the peaceful, , the peaceful ways. Um, um, I guess Bocata would be in charge by then, by that time probably. Yeah. And so it’s like, and then, but then they probably don’t even like, ’cause even though she was part of Death watch, they probably don’t even like her.
And just like, they create their own, like they create their own, um, version on Concordia. Uh, ’cause he, ’cause ’cause he admits that he, they, he thinks the, um, he thinks that, like the way of the mandal or is the, is the only way, the way that he was taught, which, , like not taking off the, the helmet, uh, and so on.
Um, so. There has to have been like, um, I don’t know. It’s very, it’s very strange to think about, but probably somewhere in between Siege Manalo and then, um, or, or maybe not even the Siege Manor somewhere between like, like mall taking over or shoot maybe even before then, who it, God, it’s a very, the timeline is very, it’s very open and I’d be very interested to, this is a interesting history of just like, like they were, maybe there’s much bigger than they actually, , thought.
Yeah. And then people were just like, oh, , it’s out in the open. We’re, we’re not hiding anymore. ? Or maybe they were just
with. Silent majority, right. Yeah. It’s, it’s the idea that, that people aren’t. People aren’t happy with the way things are, but they’re also not really talking and then they get an opportunity to talk and then that’s all they’ll talk about.
Mm-hmm. Is how much they’ve been wronged. Um, alright. I wanna get into the discussion a little bit. There’s a couple little trivia things I wanna talk about, but I assume we both liked it. Oh
yeah. It’s great episode. There’s just so much to talk about. Um, so many unanswered questions.
Yeah. I’m convinced that these episodes, if these episodes don’t exist, we don’t get Mandalorian, which means Live Action.
Star Wars fails. Um, I think you need Clone Wars and Rebels to establish this Mandalorian backstory and take us to Mandal and show us their culture and show us their internal conflicts and stripes and what’s going on with, with death Watch and these things, um, mechanically and, and it just. If you like those shows, these should be required viewing these Mandalorian episodes in the cartoons because they, Mandalorian references them a lot.
And not just with the dark saber, but like culturally and like, there’s a Death Watch is name dropped in an episode of Mandalorian. Mm-hmm. Where they say your death watch and then the armorer says Death watch is destroyed. Right. Death watch is no more, or whatever she says. Um, but she clearly, they all clearly know this story.
Yeah. And even, like, even in the time of Rebels, which is like, what, like five years before, uh, the events of a New Hope is that. When, um, when, um, when they’re trying to, um, Sabine is on, not Concordia Concord Dawn. And she’s like, , they say, , she’s confronted by the mandalorians. They ask who she is.
Um, and then she says that she is, , um. Like Clan RIN of House sla or vice versa. Then they’re like, she’s death Wash Killer.
Yeah. Yeah. So Vis SLA has a, has a rep because of these episodes.
Yeah. So and so they’re either still, , like semi-active, um, or just like, there’s just like a shoot on site sort of, um, thing.
But they’ve got a, they’ve got a fairly, their house is still, I mean, I don’t know the, the, that goes into like more speculation, but it’s, there’s just, there’s a lot that could be, , like they could, they need to like make books and comics to explain a lot of this stuff.
Alright. Move on to the Fortune cookie.
Yes. I think we already said that it applied, but anything specific?
Yeah, it’s just, well, she’s not, , she’s just pretending they didn’t have this warrior past and that’s, , you can’t get like. Like an entire civilization to just change their ways. It’s, , like they’re, I mean, the mandalorians are kind of like this Star Wars clingons.
Yeah. Is that they’re, , sure they have scientists and, , they have, , scientists and authors and artists and, , garbage men. But they’re also all warriors. They’re all trained warriors. Um, and, , they’re constantly, they have a history of fighting. They’re constantly fighting each other.
That’s not something that’s just like, um, you, you’re just gonna just be able to get out in a generation. Right. Uh, if
even, even a few generations, , it’s cultural. Right. It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s the stories they tell each other. It’s the, it’s their hero myths or all of these warriors and everything.
It’s, it’s the highest thing you can be in their society and by ignoring. She undermines her own society.
Yeah. I mean, look at the people. Who are the, the, um, you, you mentioned the, um, person who asked like if their death watch, , like they all just seemed like that, that they were just regular mandalorians, but they all had armor.
I mean like, do all like mandalorians have armor? Like is it, is like, is it kind of like, how, like, is it, if it’s the Swiss or one, one of those countries where like when, , like even after they’re out of the military, they still keep their guns.
Yeah. That’s Switzerland. I think.
Um, is it that like they all, , like that they all have like, maybe like, like mandatory, like, like service or like training.
So they all have armor, they all have like blasters and stuff. So that like, if there’s ever a time for an invasion or , they’re ever threatened, they can all, they’re all pretty much, they’re all already trained. So like, even like the, the guardsman, like a, an, , somebody who, , just, um, a gardener, , um, trying to think a, uh, trying to think of something like really, or just even like an, like an architect if the time, , if they’re called upon, , they go slap on the, um, the Mandalorian armor and they’re good to go.
And so like you, it’s like you can’t just kill that. Uh, and you can’t expect people to just, uh, get away, , from it, like speaking, , like I was never in a, in a combat, um, um, a combat arms role when I was in the military. But still, there’s, there’s still even that, like, that training that is hard to let go of that like, oh, you’re part, , you’re part of the army.
You’re, , , you might be called upon to do this or that. It’s like, that’s. Was hard to let go of just for being a, , for, , just being a, , kind of a simple non-combat, , member of the military. Now imagine if it’s part of your whole culture,
right. And that’s why I picked my quote, weapons are part of my religion.
Right. It’s not just, it’s not just something they do, it’s their belief structure. Being a, being a warrior is, is virtuous in their society.
Yeah. Like the, uh, I mean, it, it may be a little bit more with the children of the watch, but like, they’re kind of, they’re leaders or they’re like, um, their spiritual leaders are like, it’s like an armorer.
Yeah. The person who makes the weapons, they, they’re the wise one. They’re, there’s the, they’re the wise one that you go to for, to get, um. Advice. Yeah, precisely. So, yeah. So it’s, yeah. So it’s very like, just pretending, just pretending that you were never, that your society was never like this. That’s just, that’s just foolish and, , not, um, not, uh, facing reality and just, , just ignoring it is just ignoring the problem until it’s right there in your face, which is kind of what Satine does.
All right. Can I hit some trivia? I know we’re doing this recording’s very long, and we can turn it down a little bit, but can I do some trivia real quick?
All right. I’m sending you a link to a photo by Picasso called, um, woman in Beret and Robe, and it’s, it’s a portrait that is a cubist portrait that he did in 1937 of Marie Therese.
Walter, I think. Mm-hmm. Um, did you, did you get the link? Yeah, I did. I’m looking at it. So this is the painting. So in Satins Hall, in the Great Hall where Obi one meets Alek and Satin, there was a painting of her on the wall. Um, in this, in the style of this painting. And it is colorful and geometric shaped face like triangles and squares and things, and weird textures and patterns.
It’s very much a Picasso, um, style painting. They did this very intentionally because when they were designing Mandal or they wanted it to look cubist.
Yeah, it very, it, , it very much is.
And so there’s two references to Pablo Picasso in this episode. It’s that picture of, um, Satine and then in Governor Avila’s office, you can’t see it.
Uh, I’m sending you another link. You can’t see it except for like Dave finally said, it’s on screen for 12 seconds. He’s like, but they made a mural in his office that’s based on Guernica, the Horror of War, which is another cubist black and white painting of Picassos, and it is Vilas ancestor Tar Vila, um, slain like Jedi in the Jedi Wars, and it is Lonni gave a couple, in a couple interviews, talks specifically about this painting, and he says, this is what Star Wars is about.
He’s like something in the background that you don’t really get a good look at. He’s like, but there’s concept art of it. He, we spent a lot of time on it. We wanted to capture. The Goca, um, and make it look like it belonged in Star Wars. And it gives you that painting has so much backstory behind it now because of what they established here.
And I love that we talk about planets being climates, right? Like it’s the forest, it’s the ocean planet, it’s the desert planet. Mm-hmm. The inside the domes. Mandal is cubist. That’s why like the shapes of the buildings, like we talked about, um, like Mc Escher, but they’re repeating geometric patterns and that’s what they were going for with the design.
And I love that it’s an art inspired thing rather than a climate inspired thing because it is a completely artificial environment. They’re built under these domes and this desolate planet. And that’s what’s fun about it, you know?
Yeah, yeah. We should, , we should mention, did we, uh, that, uh, previs is, um, is voiced by John Favreau.
This was his introduction into Star Wars.
Uh, we didn’t mention that, but it is a good point. Um, so yeah, and he’ll go on to play other Mandalorians in the future, um, which we can talk about that in a few minutes too. Um, that’s all the trivia I want to talk about today. There’s not a whole lot else from the trivia point of view in this, but, um, we can also talk about these characters in the next episode, provided we don’t roll a one.
Mm-hmm. Do you wanna move on to,
um, the rating ratings? Yes. Okay. So, all right, so now’s the time where we rank episodes. We rank episodes by Star Wars characters. So a really great episode would be, uh, Han Luke Leia, two Evader, et cetera. , Original, uh, childy main characters, uh, bad episode would just be some character who just, if they just evaporated, all of a sudden Star would go on exactly the, uh, the same as it did beforehand.
So, Matt, what do you give this episode?
Pa Vila is a, is the Mandalorian, the big Mandalorian in the Mandalorian episodes, who has the big, like, belt fed machine gun, who’s also played by John Favreau. Mm-hmm. Or at least he’s voiced. He’s voiced by John Favreau. Yes. Mm-hmm. Um.
Yeah, I, he was act, go ahead.
Say he’s actually the source of my quote. Um, yes. That, uh, he try, he tries to take the dark saber from din jar and it didn’t work out so well.
But I think, I think my choice is obvious, um, for why, why I picked it, even though there’s some debate about whether or not he’s actually a, because he supposes his name slightly different, but I think, I think that’s not an accident.
Yeah. It’s like, no, no. I’m, I, I’m, I’m Ivis A without the Z.
Yeah. It’s Johnson with two Ns. Totally different name. Yeah. Who do you pick?
Oh, that’s a, I’m gonna go with a Boca. Um, this is nice. Yeah. This is very. This, there’s so much to unpack. I didn’t even really think about half of it until we got into this.
Well, to watching it and then watching it again, knowing what I know now, and then getting into discussion about, it’s just like, there is so much I want to know about Mandalorian culture and what’s going on, ? , Like ev even if it just starts, , just so , like, , like, like with them deciding that like, okay, wait, we’re we’re going the pacifist route.
Um, , just like what, , like, like from there, like what happened, ? Then how did you know, like how did the children, or how did the Death watch spin off? How did, um, did the children of the watch spin off?
? And now, and now that we know that Boca 10 capitulates to the Empire, do you think she does that because she.
She’s like honoring her sister in a way. Like, like, we don’t have to fight our way out of this. And then it turns out to be the worst decision she’s ever made
was Oh. Um, oh, uh, when, when she, when she gives up and then he, then they, he, uh, then, then they do the purge of Mandal. Yeah. Um, it’s possible. Like, what was her, I’m trying to remember in Rebels, what was she in, in Rebels.
Yeah. Was, was she anybody? Any note?
I don’t remember. We’d have to look that up.
Yeah. Um, yeah, I’m trying, I’m trying to remember me. Um, but yeah, that’s very, I mean, it could, that could have been her, , like sister’s influence and just a more, more mature, just like, I just don’t want any more people to die.
? Like, well just, , we’ll, , we’ll just give up, , like. Um, and just thinking, , that, , that, um, that, uh, , that, uh, Gideon, , is a man of honor, but finding out, , likes a team that don’t, I guess, don’t ever like, expect your, um, your enemies to fight with the same honor code that you have.
Yeah. So, according to, according to Wikipedia, Boan met with Ursa Ren of Clan Ren, and she was gifted the Dark Saver and told and told that she could claim the title of Manalo if she rallied troops to fight back against the Empire. And so since she accepted the Dark Saber as a gift, instead of winning in combat, people weren’t willing to follow her, but she still claimed the title of Mandal or.
So I think she, I think she was like a figurehead at best.
Right. Okay. That, yeah, that makes sense. That she was just like, she was like a, um, she was kind of like a deposed member of the Royal House, uh, who tried to regain kind of her position, but she didn’t do it the right way. Right.
She went through, went through a restoration and it didn’t work.
So, yeah. So, yeah. So she was just pretty much like a, she was probably like a powerless figurehead during the time of the empire. Like a, I guess like a Prince Harry or some, , somebody who’s just like, they’re, , they’re an important person, but they don’t really have any say in anything important
because people recognize them, not because they have power.
All right. Anything else you wanna talk about? We have more Mandalorian episodes coming up. Oh, goodie.
Um, yeah, I don’t have anything to say right now.
Alright. Um, I’m gonna roll the dye then to see what we do next. Alright. Okay.
We let the faith decide. Huh? I just happen to have a chance cube here to, it’s the boy red, his mother.
I realize you probably didn’t hear that because we’re having I did. Oh, okay. Um, all right. So at the end of every one of our episodes, I roll a D 20, a 20 sided dive from a Dungeons and Dragon style game to determine what we review next. Um, if I roll a one, we review an episode from 1985 Series E Walks, and we’re on episode season one, episode five, the Dancing Agendas.
If I roll any other number two through 20, we will review the next episode in Clone Wars in the Continuity order, which is called Voyage of Temptation, which is season two, episode 13, and is more mandal. Alright, here goes the die. I rolled an eight.
Thank goodness. Alright, so we’ll do, um.
More man to learn next week. Voyage of temptation. All right, you wanna place out?
All right. Yeah, let me do that. Oh, shoot. I lost the, okay. Outro.
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